Industry experts share their thoughts on what they believe will dominate business trends next year

As businesses look to formalise plans for the New Year –industry expert opinions become paramount to assist with forecasting and to provide a clearer understanding of crucial consumer, business and economic trends that are most likely to become impactful for businesses into 2014.

Enabling Technology

Information and communications technology (ICT) has transformed society over the last 30 years. A new wave of technological advancement is now creating novel opportunities, while testing governments’ and business’s ability to harness these benefits and provide prudent oversight to their impact. “The exponential growth in the volume and speed of access to information and communication has numerous effects,” says Frank Rizzo Technology Sector Leader, KPMG Africa. “It can generate new markets and challenge existing institutions but what we are likely to see is:

Big data initiatives creating better insight for both public and private sector entities;

The boundary between what is considered public and what is considered private for individuals becoming increasingly, blurred;

New social service models enabled by technology;

The evolution of security initiatives and policing to focus on dealing with the increase of cyber threats and cyber crime;

A transformation of communication due to increased mobility demands by consumers and the workforce.”

Consumer Electronics sees strong growth

A transformation of communication is being driven by the need for consumer electronics. The U.S. Consumer Electronics Sales and Forecasts (July 2013) projects that industry sales will reach $202.6 billion this year, stable compared to 2012 sales, with 0.2% growth. Looking ahead to 2014, industry sales growth is forecasted to increase by 4.5%, with industry revenues reaching $211.7 billion.

“There is no doubt that the smartphone – and more specifically the premium smartphone – has made huge inroads across Africa in recent years and this is not set to change any time soon due to demand and compatibility,” says George Ferreira, VP and COO of Samsung Electronics Africa. “As a result, building locally and relevant content and services directly related to the African market will remain key to Consumer Electronic brands – as this not only demonstrates company commitment to the continent, but positively impacts and enhances the lives of consumers.”

Gys Kappers, CEO of WyseTalk agrees but mentions that we can’t ignore feature phones. “A large part of the African market is dominated by feature phones with more than 300 million feature phones in the market and as such we cannot overlook this market but need to accommodate it and ensure that we continue to develop apps and services that are feature phone friendly.”

Big Data – Volume, variety, velocity

However as smartphone penetration increases and digital content rises, no matter what industry you are involved in, you have likely heard about the concept of ‘Big Data’! In fact, the IDC* is predicting that the Big Data market will grow at a rate of 31.7% until it reaches $23.8 billion in 2016.

“Businesses need to get smarter with their data,” says Martin Rennhackkamp, CIO at PBT Group. “As such using more data visualisation to understand and detect valuable insights in big data will become increasingly important to present accurate analytical insights and results in a more user friendly and simpler format to business users.”

With the continued drive to get insights and to apply analytics faster, the adoption of in-memory databases and in-memory analytics will continue to rise. “The biggest change I foresee is on the social media/social analytics front,” continues Rennhackkamp. “Many organisations are doing, or are interested in doing sentiment analysis. It’s all good to analyse what is being said – and what the sentiment of that is – but we also need to consider the influence and context of the speaker/tweeter/poster – so interest and the application of influence analysis will likely rise.”

Maven Agency couldn’t agree more. Says Dawie Harmse, co-founder and head of technology at Maven Agency: “2013 was the year of big data undoubtedly. Now, with all the data comes the remarketing of it and the opportunity to analyse and interpret it to best suit the business. As a result, customer relationship management (CRM) & email re-marketing should see a rise in popularity once more. Through in-depth analysis of the data, businesses can send the consumers on targeted journeys of communication that fits their interests and criteria.”

More Access More Wi-Fi

As the need for constant access rises, 2014 will be a breakout year for Wi-Fi – from solving congestion for mobile network operators to open access networks in public spaces. “We are likely to see more Wi-Fi in malls, stadiums and public places,” says Michael Fletcher, sales director for Ruckus Wireless sub-Saharan Africa. “While we have seen a large uptake from the hospitality and education sectors, we are likely to see more Wi-Fi in public places and hotels who will be forced to provide good quality Wi-Fi and in most cases for free – just like hot water.”

One of the major challenges for free Wi-Fi is to make sure it works. The free Wi-Fi projects tend to be done very cost-effectively so when the uptake is good, it cannot handle the capacity which results in very disgruntled customers.

“Wi-Fi is no longer the ugly stepchild of licensed wireless access. The potential that Wi-Fi has to change and open up the telecommunications landscape across Africa, as with the rest of the world, cannot be denied and so we will continue to see greater need and interest in this incredible technology enabler,” adds Fletcher.

Content remains King

As wireless access increases, content generated for a specific target audience is going to be a big trend in 2014. Adds Harmse: “Delivering personalised experiences to the right audience at the right time will prove to be essential, which means that brands will need to focus on genuine quality of their content to not only build solid brand awareness but also loyalty. Additionally by making some content available only to a select audience, brands can build value into key relationships.”

Furthermore, having content readily available on all forms of mobile devices will be essential, and as a direct result of the growth in use of smartphones and tablets having a responsive website will be essential.

“In 2014, the likelihood that a piece of online content will be shared among users will be directly related to how many images it contains,” says Harmse. “Sites such as Pinterest, Slideshare and Tumblr have skyrocketed in popularity due to the emerging trend of pictures over words. Images will outrank words for valuable data. Less will become more and a big trend will be to simplify marketing messages in 2014, taking away the guess work and leaving a solid impression on the consumer.”

The Rise of the Individual

The consumer will be key in 2014. Advances in global education, health and technology have helped empower individuals like never before, leading to increased demands for transparency and participation in all aspects of decision-making. Says Rizzo: “Consequently; growing individual empowerment will present numerous challenges to government structures and business processes, but if harnessed, could unleash significant economic development and social advancement.”

WyseTalk concurs. “With the convergence of technologies we are seeing more business centric solutions as companies need to look at collaborative ways of working/operating that will encourage both employees and their consumers to become actively involved in the business or brand. As such, we are bound to see a big focus on collaborative software (social business software) and a slow migration away from email centricity,” says Kappers.

The world is changing rapidly. Technology is connecting people and disrupting existing assumptions and ways of communicating and doing business. “Business innovation will be crucial in the coming year not only around the generation of new ideas, technologies and products for example, but also aspects around how to fully support these changing business models will also become a key component,” adds Ferreira.

And finally, concludes Rizzo; “developing country governments may need to consider how enabling technology can provide ‘leapfrog’ opportunities that can bypass intermediate technologies and/or legacy systems.”